Physics and Paintball

[phantomhitman]

i usually pull the trigger and my marker shoots paintballs i am glad we have people this smart on this board, that way i can brag about it to lesser boards that are not worthy

[FallNAngel]

Physics don't apply to paintball, everyone knows cockers and trix's shoot farther than anyother gun.

you forgot flatter.... farther and flatter than any other gun.

[Destructo6]

Of course you will need calculus. How else can you derrive x'(t) velocity and x''(t) acceleration from the position function?

There are a bunch of programs on the net that will solve your projectile motion problems.

[Smitty2k1]

Good old physics I and its ignoring air resistance and friction and just about anything.

Physics II should be fun, and then off to college.

Here I come mechanical engineering!

[kscullin]

Unfortunately, how wind resistance affects the ball also depends on windspeed and direction. Paintballs are so lightweight compared to their cross section that a decent tailwind can affect the range, as can a decent headwind. Those also don't take into account crosswinds (tangential velocities). I think it'd take some tables to really lay it out, along with assumptions about actual realistic playing conditions (e.g. I doubt anyone would try to play with 15mph winds - or at least would expect good range/accuracy results).

[Orion33]

whats weird is no matter what..unless something generates lift...

an object will fall 9.8 metres/second

so if u shoot a gun..every second the bullet will drop that much...its just it moves so fast u have a greater range

[goddom]

I didn't see anyone ask this question: "why do we need to know this?" I have taken physics before and I don't think it will help one bit to knwo the equations to shoot someone. I won't be sitting behind the bunker with a laptop computer measuring wind speed/direction and then caluctaion teh proper trajectory of the shot. I guess I could, but it doesn't seem like as much fun to me :-).

But a computer program that can calculate the speed of a paintball at various distances from the gun and the effects of wind resistence would be cool.

[spacedtedybear]

Well, yeah the gravitational acceleration downward will always be 9.8 m/s^2 unless the mass of Earth changes. Yes, one cannot apply highschool physics to real world applications. When we do use these basic calculations, we are assuming ideal conditions ( no air resistence, no drag, no spin, CG is right at center of ball), because this is based on the initial conditions that everything is equal. IE same paint, same barrel. That and because there aren't a whole lot of people that can do or understand complex calculus, and advanced mechanics.

[sig11]

Of course you will need calculus. How else can you derrive x'(t) velocity and x''(t) acceleration from the position function?

He just gave you the first and second derivatives.

Physics II should be fun, and then off to college.

College Phys 2 for me is electricity and magnetism. Its kinda fun. heh I don't see what everyone complained about. Its pretty simple.

Yes, one cannot apply highschool physics to real world applications. When we do use these basic calculations, we are assuming ideal conditions

It may not be exact, but it gives a good general idea. Do you need to know that the range is about .3m shorter because of air resistance?

[Pacifist_Farmer]

Actually for all intents and purposes, High school physics will get you farther in paintball flight than 6 or 8 years of college level physics.

Being able to say "the ball will travel this far, at these speeds" is much more useful to us in the paintball world than accurately modeling the system with every minor detail. Assume some "efficiency", like 70 or 60 percent, multiply your ""highschool physics" results by the chosen effieciency, and youll probably get a pretty good idea of the balls path.

Now if your really getting into the mechanics of your marker where actual effeciencies do matter, and performance doesnt necessarily vary with regard to wind resistance, which is a constantly changing variable, then you'll need some higher level fluid flow, and thermodynamic thinking. This is where your college degree might come in handy.

[kscullin]

Goddom, you don't sit behind your bunker with your graphing calculator plotting trajectories and angles before you snapshoot? Doc would be disappointed. I thought we all did that by this point.

[Pacifist_Farmer]

you know whats great..... the TI-92 .....it has a full keyboard in addition to all the numerical and operator buttons

[sig11]

you know whats great..... the TI-92 .....it has a full keyboard in addition to all the numerical and operator buttons

Bah, get a real calculator... an HP!

[vf-xx]

Bah, get a real calculator... an HP!

I own 3. 49, 48G, 48SX.

Doesn't matter much tho. This year they re-did the rules for the FE banning all calculators with Alpha numeric storage....

Poo.

[Mr. Frodo]

Bah, get a real calculator... an HP!

I get a kick out of lending mine to people who don't know RPN.